


{I May Have Lost My Way Now} Haven't Forgotten My Way Home

by Fake_Brit



Series: Sigh no more [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, POV Clint Barton, Post CA:TWS, non aou compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-10
Updated: 2016-04-10
Packaged: 2018-06-01 10:58:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6515674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fake_Brit/pseuds/Fake_Brit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i> " It’s been years, he thinks wryly. Sarcasm or not, she’s an open book to me. " </i> Or, Clint gets a visit back in Iowa and realises that, PTSD or not, things will be okay. [ <b>Chronologically speaking this is #2.5 fic in my series - further explanation in the notes </b>]</p>
            </blockquote>





	{I May Have Lost My Way Now} Haven't Forgotten My Way Home

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, yes, it's been a long time since I post anything related to my Clintasha story and I'm very sorry about it, but senior year of high school has been draining me of any energy and my writing time's been pretty scarce. Originally, I'd planned to write a Clint-centric extra between chapter 2 and 3 of the aforementioned story (Feel free to check it out, by the way. And yes, chapter three will be on here, eventually, I promise) aka between Natasha's pov of the avengers and CA:TWS, to show what he did after Loki from direct post New York to pre!AoU, but I started writing and that's what came out. I hope you enjoy. :)   
> Ps: the title is from Broken by Lifehouse. So, yes, angst-y times are to be expected

“So you’re saying,” the words stop awkwardly, they mess each other up, and his breath fastens in the silence.

“I’m saying,” her voice rings out, as clear as nothing’s ever been – or, well, as clear as the nothing he actually remembers. “That this is, to put it mildly, bullshit.”

In retrospect, he should have known this would have been the place he’d end up being at.

Natasha’s let him go once, already.

(The note he’d written – scrawny and hurried and leaking, he remembers. If he thinks about it, his hands still feel damp with ink. It said, “Guess it’s my turn to go to Rome solo, huh” – had been tucked and hidden in her books as he left before dawn tinted everything in golden. _Hope_ , some say.)

Now, though, her grip on him feels like an iron pair of cuffs. (And even if the eyes scrolling through this were Tony Stark’s, _no, that ain’t no pun,_ get your bloody mind out of that pitch-black gutter, Red Metal)

He’s wandered eyes full of ghosts and ears full of whimpers and screams and a voice that was his but also wasn’t, for a long time.

Out of all the places he could’ve nested in, waiting for it all to click ~~back~~ into place, waiting for his sight to finally stop tricking him into believing Hawkeye was an hawk no more, he stopped where he had once been a child. Where, he remembers as nausea surges up like a bolt, he first saw the purple of a bruise, and blood flow out of him to the sound of screams coming from people who were supposed to be gentle, loving, and protective.

(Nothing but lies and dreams and fantasies, like the ones nuns used to tell him about finding a home for him and his brother – a.k.a a lie made flesh)

He keeps silent, as the leaves around them whisper in the wind.

“As true as that may be, Nat,” he breathes the words out in a calm tone, lower than a whisper, and yet he sees her flinch as though he’d yelled.“I don’t,” his voice stops on the word, like air is being choked out of him, and he gulps down his own saliva. “I still feel like a milkshake, pardon the crappy comparison, and now you are looking pretty shaky, too,”

Her chest swells with a sigh, just as her eyes cloud over. “Yep, the quake hasn’t settled for me, either,”

He cringes as her voice fades into the air, small despite her attempt at humor. It’s been years, he thinks wryly. Sarcasm or not, she’s an open book to me. 

( _As I am to her_ ,he reasons. It’s not just his note he remembers. He remembers staring at her as he trembled, holding onto her when his brain decided to play things – events, mostly – on a loop. He remembers. And it is burning through him)

“Well,” he sighs, taking a step closer. They’ve never been good at words – a consequence of their job, perhaps. And a certain URSS-based stuff of nightmares facility. That’s a topic he’s not up to talk about now, though. Feels too much like foreseeing he should have heeded, somehow.

Nat doesn’t move. He sees what has gone unsaid until now in the way she stands, stiff and so still that it looks like she’s seconds away from splitting into rough-edged, bleeding halves. _S.H.I.E.L.D has fallen; we have been torn to pieces. Will this be to final shot – the one that finally makes into us ghosts walking the Earth?_

His own posture mirrors that sentiment, doubts swirling around in his head.

“Well, indeed,” the Black Widow counters, eyeing her partner. Her gaze says _going back to Rome might be a good idea._ “Whatcha say about giving me a tour, Clint?”

He nods, his grimace softening. They make their way toward the house, but the silence is no longer suffocating. Truth to be told, it’s rather… Comfortable. They may be walking through the ruins of their own lives, but something tells him it will lead to something worth rummaging around rubble for.

Natasha’s necklace shines – hope isn’t golden. It’s silver.

And as silver gleams in the Iowa sun, team Delta starts the climbing towards whatever lies up ahead.


End file.
